A somewhat day-to-day account of what a 30-something Canadian wife and mom gets up to in a tiny Greek village

Sunday, December 8, 2013

Fun in the Kitchen!

Hi!

How are you?

Over the years I've noticed that when you ask a Greek person "how are you?" most of the time they're going to tell you they're fine. They will NEVER say that they're not fine, but sometimes they'll say

But my guess is that since they don't like to say they're not fine, then maybe that's what "I'm trying" actually means. It's like they're putting a positive twist on what seems to be a negative connotation.

Why does it seem to be a negative connotation? It's the way they say it!

It's like they just stuffed all the depression

from every country & western song ever written

into 1 word!

(it's one word in Greek...)

I'm trying - TRANSLATION: "I'm trying my absolute best to put on a happy face right now, when really I hate the world, I'm completely surrounded by crap, everyone sucks, you suck for starting this stupid conversation in your stupid 'la la la everything is perfect' voice and I'M HAVING THE WORST HAIR DAY OF MY LIFE! ANYTHING ELSE YOU WANT TO ASK?? BECAUSE I'M TRYING, I'M REALLY TRYING TO HAVE THIS CONVERSATION WITH YOU INSTEAD OF RUNNING THROUGH THE STREETS SMASHING THINGS AND SCREAMING LIKE A LUNATIC, ALRIGHT?!"

It's possible I'm getting a little carried away with this but my point is, IF the objective is to give the impression that all is good when really it isn't...

then "I'm trying" actually ends up sounding a lot worse then if you just came out with it and said,

"I'm shit today, but thanks for asking."

So that was just a little thought that's been rolling around in my brain for a few years now....no big deal....

I'm doing great today, thanks very much! So I guess that means I'm not trying at all!! Nope, no that really does not work in the opposite direction.....

Ok, so Fun in the Kitchen is our topic today. Lets move onto that shall we?

Last week we had a lovely group of ladies from Finland in the restaurant for a cooking class!

Olympia showed them how to make stuffed calamari...

...they were a little freaked out about touching raw squid but as you can see, they were all good sports

Spanikopita was also on the agenda

Lefteris showed them a few things too, here he's frying the spinach and cheese pies

They also learned how to make Gigantes, the giant white beans in tomato sauce

And the students were very attentive...until I showed up with our little Eleni of course

I'm going to ruin this photo for Antonis and tell you that even though you can't see her, he's holding Eleni in front of him

and that's why an entire room of women are staring his way with dreamy eyes and huge smiles...

Sorry babe, no matter how gorgeous you may be Eleni will ALWAYS steal the spotlight

...I promise I won't tell anyone else what's really going on here....

Mmmmmm! Fresh spanikopita and tiropita!

And finally after a job well done it was time to open the wine and dig in!

Today we were in another kitchen, but still having fun.....

Eleni has made it very clear over the last couple of days, that she's completely bored with her toys

About Me

I decided to start this blog to keep my family and friends back home updated on life over here. They might not be that interested but I've always been a touch of a narcissist so at least this will keep me entertained haha!